Anime

Contents

Background

In YGGDRASIL, undead was one of the many races a Player can choose to be and play as. Moreover, such race is divided into different subspecies according to their racial level, allowing players to further evolve beyond it. This goes along well with the right classes specifically that are befitting for someone who was an undead. A necromancer for starters was a class that allowed one to gain control over an undead or create one as their own slave.

Being an Overlord of a high-tier race, one could create a more powerful undead than what an Elder Lich or other undead are capable of doing. To create a permanent undead that cannot disappear easily until killed in battle, one needs the target's dead body or any least bit of their remains including bones to carry it out. The corpse's quality determines the level of an undead one creates. In this case, the Sunlight Scripture's corpses at most can create the kind of undead up to level 40 at max. Beyond such limit while using their corpses, the undead would vanish with the passage of time, along with the corpses that served as their medium. Even without a vessel for summoning the undead, he is still able to spawn one out of thin air. Yet the undead created also could not stay in the New World for long.

Since the quality of the undead produced can vary by what kind of species the corpse originated from, the best corpses for example were those of powerful beings like dragons. In particular, human corpses are one of the few races that were shown to have turn into that of a zombie and skeleton. The stronger the physical body, the more powerful the undead. One prime example of it would be zombie dragons or trolls like Guu. As well as the latter who is Ainz, an undead player turning a mere human corpse into the form of a Death Knight. Undead can also be created from the likes of animals such as wolves, snakes, cobras, and so on. They're an undead beast that combined the tenacity of zombies with the agility of animals. There are even some among the Dragon Lords, one of the strongest species from the New World that were said to be an undead themselves.

In some shape or form, Ainz's way of using the corpses seem as if a resurrection is taking place, yet the targets that are dead will come back to life as an undead rather than alive in the flesh through a racial skill. Though it is different from a normal resurrection via a tier spell, where the person is supposed to be brought back to life not as an undead, but part of the living instead. It seems also apparent that certain undead monsters have some sort of ability which allows them to spawn a weaker undead through the target they've killed. Depending on the undeads' abilities like Crypt Lord or Overlord, they could go as far as buffed their own undead minions to be more stronger than it normally was supposed to be while controlling them.

Along the way, there happens to be a healing-type spell such as "Greater Lethal" that can heal the undead through it's generated Negative Energy. However, when exposed to the kind of healing-type spell that uses Positive Energy, undead would be the one sustaining damage instead of the heal.

On the other hand, the undead are looked upon as monsters that possess an undying hatred for all living creatures and its intent was to eradicate them. It was the reason why the undead are considered to be the enemy of all living beings negatively. Yet, there are few exceptions to this idea in which Ainz Ooal Gown and Davernoch, who doesn't see it the same way they do, but was still indifferent to them nonetheless in terms of not being able to show emotions physically. Despite Yuri Alpha being an undead, she doesn't seem to bear any ill hatred towards the living and regarded some of them with kindness instead. Also, the same could be said with Evileye, an undead who works in a group like Blue Roses consisting of humans.

Although the undead possesses hatred against the living, there are some who're able to somehow suppress it and reach a mutual understanding with them to some extent. In other words, certain sentient undead are capable of keeping their hatred under control when negotiating and forming relations with the living. If the living were the ones who try to offer negotiation first, then it would usually end up turning out to be a bad trade. But if the undead were to initiate the first offer or negotiation, there had once been instances of people obtaining ancient items that had been made with now-forgotten knowledge. Whenever Ainz issues mental commands over the weaker undead, they won't be able to easily attack the living out of their nature unless it was ordered to do so by their master.

While so, the undead do not age, so they would continue ruling the land for all eternity until it was defeated. Unlike the dragons' own growth rate, high-level undead are not the type to grow in bodily might. Instead, they could accumulate knowledge and experience constantly over time. From that point of view, the undead might be even stronger than dragons. Among the many undead out there, Titus, a Skeleton Mage is attempting to master a new methodology of crafting scrolls as well as translate the New World's language and thereby improve himself.

When a group of weaker undead gather in one place, stronger undead are then created after a certain period of time passes by. Undead normally spawned in places such as the Katze Plains where many people died. For example, a Death Knight and other undead spawning at that location tends to be a hotspot for their birth. Such effect could also be used in tangent alongside a magic ritual called Death Spiral that turn a living person into an undead like the Elder Lich. Though this ceremony requires the sacrifice of a location composed with living entities to form another place for naturally spawn undead. They gather together in numbers, causing the birth of a more powerful undead to appear one after another while the cycle continuously repeats itself.

In the New World, it seems there are legendary tales recorded and passed down about the undead. One being the Soul Eaters, which devoured the souls of the living. While another case being the Wriggle Pestilences, which spread disease. Additionally, there are mage cabals which gathered many undead around a core of Elder Liches for instance. And then there was Guphandera Argoros, the undead dragon that lurked in a mountain of the dead and is a user of psychic-type magic. Not only that, but this also includes the Astral Rippers, masses of shadows which stalked the Valley of Shadows, and so on.

Although the undead could be dominated through magic, the only human who succeeded in doing so was one of the Thirteen Heroes being Rigrit, a necromancer. However, dominating the undead requires a rather complicated process even for the likes of Fluder to master. The undead do also happen to have absolute resistance to the effect of mind control spells. Controlling the minds of undead with magic is next to impossible unless it was done through a World Item such as Downfall of Castle and Country. The control and destruction of undead should be done by priests using the power of god. If one chooses to become an undead in the New World, their heart and mind will begin to alter as well. The change to the undead state often affects the soul too as far as Evileye knows it, since she is an example of one who was once a human being.

Unknown Undead

Trivia

The Baharuth Empire is conducting experiments to make undead laborers under their control. However, it seems apparent that Ainz is already doing just that with his undead minions, lending them out to the citizens and dealers of his nation for various tasks.

Those who died a violent death and the dead who were not properly revered have the highest chance of becoming undead.

Because it is uncertain what causes the spontaneous genesis of the undead, the Baharuth Empire is currently investigating the reason for that.

To prevent the dead from becoming undead, the people of the New World have taken to making proper burials for the dead as soon as possible when death occurs.

Albedo once tried to conduct an experiment to determine which type of undead could feel emotions, but her findings were cut short after she got into an altercation with Shalltear.

There exists a secret society that only consisted of undead Magic Casters.

Undead were the first of its kind in the Overlordseries known to spawn in the New World as it seem apparent that their birth looks to be limitless even after death.